Family Matters: Don’t underestimate the power of play

Children who are provided with new and intentional learning experiences, continuously engaged through positive parent-child interactions, tend to achieve more, with fewer misbehaviors. There are many simple activities that nurture thinking skills, and help to build emotional regulation.

Children who are provided with new and intentional learning experiences, continuously engaged through positive parent-child interactions, tend to achieve more, with fewer misbehaviors. There are many simple activities that nurture thinking skills, and help to build emotional regulation.

It’s easy to get caught up with household responsibilities and use TV as a babysitter. Instead, present a fun activity that can spark imagination, yet require minimal effort or energy on your part. Play together, at least once a day, and you’ll notice the difference in your child’s behavior. Here’s your parenting play list:

• Fine motor skills. 1. String colored cereal loops on a ribbon or yarn while identifying colors and making patterns. 2. At snack time, allow your child to use a plastic knife to cut shapes of triangles, circles and rectangles from flat cheese slices. 3. Carefully push raisins in a straight line into a banana to make bugs on a log.

• Large motor skills. 1. Hand your child a blue item and encourage him to find all the items in one room with the same color. Do it again, with a different colored item. 2. Place a long string on the floor around the couch, under the table, etc., symbolizing a road that he can follow with small toy cars. 3. Get up and dance! 4. Walk across the room together, heel-to-toe, counting how many steps it takes from one end to the other. Who took more steps?

• Language development. 1. Play “I spy with my little eye, something that is… (green, big, old).” 2. Begin a continuous story; (Start) One day I … (next person) went out to the backyard where I saw a … (next person) big brown bear, who … 3. Read at least one story a day, while you cuddle and giggle.

• Science. 1. Mix a brownie mix using measuring cups and spoons. Watch as oven heat changes the mix from liquid to solid. 2. Ignite a volcano by pouring vinegar onto a pile of baking soda. 3. Dig in the dirt and use a magnifying glass to see who lives there.

• Tap into emotions. 1. Pull out your family photo album and tell family stories. 2. Get out your child’s baby book and tell him his story. 3. Tell your child why you love him, three times a day, every day! 4. Initiate dinner table-talk and ask, “What is the best thing that happened to you today? What is the saddest thing that happened? What is a happy thing that happened?”